


Another Day at Riverbend Hall

by vass



Category: Babysitters' Club
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-10-02
Updated: 2008-10-02
Packaged: 2017-10-02 01:29:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 680
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1207
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/vass/pseuds/vass
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Canon notes: based heavily on BSC #126, <em>The All-New Mallory Pike</em>, in which Mallory goes to Riverbend Hall, a progressive, all-girl boarding school for girls with artistic talent.<br/>Written October 29, 2005.</p>
    </blockquote>





	Another Day at Riverbend Hall

**Author's Note:**

> Canon notes: based heavily on BSC #126, _The All-New Mallory Pike_, in which Mallory goes to Riverbend Hall, a progressive, all-girl boarding school for girls with artistic talent.  
> Written October 29, 2005.

Ever notice how really dramatic things happen just when you least expect it? It was just another day at Riverbend. I was in the dining hall when it happened, having lunch with Smita and Sarah and Jen, talking over English class. By the way, I love it how at Riverbend it's not at all weird to talk about study! I could never have had this sort of conversation in Stoneybrook Junior High.

We all had to research a poet or a playwright and present on their life and work. Sarah was spreading her arms and declaming... Sarah is an actress, and she lives for the 'theatah', as she says. She was named after Sarah Bernhardt, the famous actress. Where was I? Sarah was declaming "I shall study the Divine Oscar! Also known as Oscar Wilde, darlings."  
"That's great," Smita said. "I love 'The Importance of Being Earnest'. Are you going to focus more on his plays, his poems or his prose?"  
With Sarah, that was a trick question. She swept past it. "And who will you be unveiling for us, Mallory?" I grinned.  
"Virginia Woolfe," I said. I'd been thinking about her ever since John, our teacher, talked a bit about her life. (We call all our teachers by their first names - it was so weird before I got used to it, but it really makes me think about how we're all going to be grown up soon too. It makes me want to live up to that.)

I told my friends why I'd chosen Virginia Woolfe. She wrote a book called 'A Room Of One's Own' about how women need their own space to write. I really liked that idea, because I'm the eldest of seven siblings, and once I had to go on strike to make everyone give me a bit of peace and quiet. I decided to read the book and report on it for class. Also, she had a sister called Vanessa, and so do I. (Vanessa wanted a room of her own too, after I moved to Riverbend, but that's another story.)

"And she was a lesbian too, darling, don't forget," said Sarah. I must have looked puzzled or something, because she waved her hand back and forth in my face, and said "Hasn't anyone mentioned that word to you before, Mallory?" And they hadn't.

I suppose they had really, or I'd heard it on TV, but I'd never really paid attention. I was paying attention now, and Sarah was saying "Like gay, darling, only with women!" and right then, like an epiphany (a cool word we learned in class, meaning a sudden awakening) I saw Jessi's face, as clearly as if she was at Riverbend with me.

I said it out loud. "I'm in love with Jessi!" Everybody went all quiet, but nobody said anything mean, or even anything silly like "Are you sure?"  
Smita said "Your best friend?" and my roommate Jen said "Oh my God," very quietly, and squeezed my hand.

Then the bell rang and it was time for gym.

All through yoga I thought about Jessi. We were practising the asanas (that means poses) that we'd learned the week before. I did tree pose, where you balance on one leg and reach your arms up over your head, and put your hands together. In yoga you're meant to be concentrating on breathing and sending your energy out through your hands, but in my mind I was seeing Jessi dancing, how calm and still her face looks even when she's spinning across the floor in a pirouette.

Then we had math, and I had to work on introductory accounting. My project was a lot like what Stacey does for the BSC . And then I had a free block, and I thought about Jessi again. How I was going to have to email her tonight (we write most nights) and how I didn't know what I was going to say. And Jessi likes Quint. And how on earth was I going to act when I went back to Connecticut for the holidays?


End file.
